those albums were made by people who were 100% focused on creating amazing and emotional art.

it's too bad that these same people generally lose that focus, and start to focus on other things (money, popularity)...things which absolutely destroy art.

This is probably also testament to why you're a moderator, as Early Enslaved is the first band of the second wave of the (identifiably) Black Metal genre that pops into my mind that clearly represented Asatru, Heathenism and Nordic antiquity aggressively, undiluted in such a way that other bands dared not to venture into, whether it be due to lack of interest, or fleeting type of flirtation with the aesthetic. Simply popping a Mjollnir into your logo or around your neck, wearing armor and dress akin to the dark-ages period and taking a pseudonym from Scandinavian mythology has always been popular in this culture, but Enslaved wrote propaganda as much as they wrote lyrics. Whatever they say nowadays seems much like explanations away from heated dogma; I have their first DVD and the interview in the special features is less than inspirational. It's also contradictory to their original lyrical expression:

Midgards Eldar"The call of the GjallarhornReturn to the ring of our forefathers godsThe flames of Midgard's fires and ancient mystisism still are

Asgardsreien rides with terror above the villageMjolner is swung, thunder and lightening!The landmarks of the VikingsWolves and ravens guards the throne"

Svarte Vidder"The ravens are flying, the one eyed watchesInto the fog, shadows appearMemories from the first empire covered with goldRunes scratched in, scratches in by hatredThe hordes of the one eyed are riding once againHammer crushes crossInverted by the unboundDark clouds gather, the light retreats

Burned landscape, where it earlier bloomedBattle fields for the firstA black empire, eternal winterFrozen fields, eternal coldLightening and thunder commands from the firstEternal storms, an evil monsoonA wall of darknessThe voice is calling, the circle completed

The age of wolvesHunger and despairMother earthExpect your death

Warriors are gathered through the dreamRe-conquering the old norse throneUnder new flagsWith the swords held highThe ravens are flying, the one eyed watchesInto the fog, shadows appearFalling icons in a holy warBlack mountain plateaus the battle is won

The age of wolvesHunger and despairMother earthExpect your death"

Wotan"Naked, waste landscapeVast plains lead to the seashore in the westA northern wind sweeps over dead bodiesA stranger has entered the domains of the vikings

Die not lying sick, dastardly cowardDraw sword, fight with the war godsWotan!

We shall fight until we see BitrostWe shell fight until Heimdal flows the GjallarhormWe shall fight for our domainsWe shall fight with the war godsWotan!

Die not lying sick, dastardly cowardDraw sword, fight with the war godsWotan!"

Clearly, contained in their lyrics is as much propaganda as there is poetry. Enslaved played with spirit, and I believe this is the very same spirit originally mentioned in the OP's drunken rambling. They had a mission to ignite an interest of active participation in ancient practices. When a band is motivated at such a level, I think this motivation becomes the spirit that a band like Enslaved played with, and propelled their mature and advanced writing technique. I think what separated them from others is that they believed they were creating hymns to represent the Gods and the culture they so vigorously believed in, whereas what we can see in other examples is that bands tend to adopt this thematic primarily for the focus of standing out, explaining a lot of the lessening of the spirit.

Nightspirit: Bjornson has some interesting things to say on Until the Light Takes Us about how he and Kjellson conceived of Enslaved in the first place. He mentioned he grew up with Norway's native myths and stories. His parents were academics and this literature was always around the house. One of the biggest mind-blowers for me is that Bjornson was 15 when he wrote a lot of those original Enslaved songs.

Vikingligr Veldi: perfect album. One of the few metal albums that constantly unfolds with repeated listens, yet never truly reveals all of its inner magic.

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As such its appeal is lost on many; there is no dominant mood, but a range of moods variantly saturated with sadness, ambition, youth, despair and a hopeful sense of structuralist pragmatism in service to an ideal based in belief in life and its darkness and light. No album more "beyond good and evil" has been so subtly stated however, and the progressive inspiration to gestate concept and project reason in the form of fantastic voyages into the subconscious desire for existence of all free spirits, while brilliantly executed and reasonable in musicianship, remains underappreciated for its contributions not to black metal but to metal as a whole in gesturing a compositional complexity which could in fairness be called symphonic.

Out of all ANUS reviews, I can't think of a statement that cuts closer to the gestalt of the music more so than this one.

(1) Reverence for the ancient(2) Sense of being inspired by a spiritual field to life itself, e.g. the Aeolian harp metaphor(3) Desire for independence from the herd (including a rejection of social-good and social-evil) and cities(4) Adoration of nature(5) Notion of technology as amoral(6) A type of nihilism: God does not give meaning to life, the logicality of life gives meaning to life/God(7) You won't like this but: piety

What happened about the same time:

(1) Kant: evil is not external, evil is bad choices made by the majority of people

Problems of Romanticism:

(1) Divided by enlightenment. Much of it got easily sidetracked into the new revolution and SWPL-land

Why it endures:

(1) Appeals to our sense of meaning outside of the social-defined good/evil and popular/unpopular categories(2) Appeals to something higher than current techno-rodent-like existence

Reverence can exist for many things, but there must be a sense of an order to it all. It's what you discover in the forest, if you go in for the duration. There is a point. It's not inherent; it can be denied. But it's there as an option and in a relative universe, that's better than inherent.

I learned everything I know from long unattended periods in the forest. I don't even remember the passage of time. It was like a glimpse of monism, a timeless space in which every possibility existed at once.